


A Hand for Mrs. Claus

by TheGirlWhoWearsBlack



Series: My Christmas Jukebox [5]
Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Christmas, Christmas Fluff, Christmas Party, Costumes, F/M, One Shot, Santa's Elves
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-09
Updated: 2020-12-09
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:21:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27978780
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheGirlWhoWearsBlack/pseuds/TheGirlWhoWearsBlack
Summary: In order to keep up the illusion for the children, a professional Santa Claus elf, calls her boyfriend Spencer Reid to fill in.
Relationships: Spencer Reid/Reader
Series: My Christmas Jukebox [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2036053
Kudos: 18





	A Hand for Mrs. Claus

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! Welcome to day 5 of "My Christmas Jukebox": 12 days, 12 one shots inspired by 12 of my favorite Christmas songs. I'll be posting every other day until completed as we all get in the spirit and mood for this holiday season.
> 
> Today's shot is inspired by the song "A Hand For Mrs. Claus" by Idina Menzel ft. Ariana Grande.  
> Enjoy!

Christmas is magical for many different reasons. The one that stands the most, especially to children, is Santa Claus. For some reason, getting gifts from an overweight stranger who crawls into your home in the middle of the night is the source of true magic for the little ones. Part of the magic is getting to meet Santa Claus, most commonly, at malls. Grown men and women dressed up as Santa Claus, elves and all sorts of characters from the North Pole to interact with children that sit on a stranger man’s lap to confess their true wishes while someone else takes a picture.

As weird as it sounds on paper, staging all of that just to provide children with one more year of faith and happiness was something YN was passionate about. Christmas as a whole was simply her favorite time of the year because it reminded her of the magic she used to feel when she was a kid. Now that she was older, giving that to the new generations was all the magic she needed.

When YN was a teen, she worked with a mall Santa as an elf, helping organize the queue, give away candy canes and overall maintaining the illusion. She loved it, every second of it.

YN graduated from elf school when she became a professional photographer and graduated from actual art school. Now that she had the skills to take the pictures herself, YN started her own North Pole operation and took it to places where she could reach every kid possible, not only the ones at malls. 

The chaos reigned at the venue. YN had never seen anything like that before. And she had been at the Santa Claus business for more than a decade of her life. She felt terrible for the way things turned out and for potentially ruining this one day for the kids at the shelter.

YN dialed the phone of the only person she could think of in times of crisis; her sweet boyfriend Spencer Reid. She and Spencer had been dating for almost two years and they were genuinely happy. It was hard when he was away but they made it work because they cared for each other and for what they’d built together. They were practically made for each other in a weird way. They weren’t alike but somehow compatible, like puzzle pieces. 

“Pick up, pick up…” YN mumbled to herself while squashing her phone against her ear.

“YN?”

“Spencer! Hey!” She yelled with excitement the second she heard her boyfriend’s voice. “Are you at work?”

“Hotch gave us the day in compensation for the ten days we spent in Arkansas. Why?”

“Really? awesome!”

“YN, what’s going on?”

“I need you to come down to St. Francis, please.” She rushed her words as if doing that it would suddenly be easier to convince Spencer to come.

“Is everything alright?”

“Well, not exactly.” YN murmured anxiously.

Spencer could hear through the distance some kids yelling, things crashing and firm voices asking for order. YN knew that Spencer would do just about anything for her, that he would probably take a bullet for her, but what she wanted to ask for him was next level and it was unlikely for him to say yes.

“I need you to fill in for one of my elves.”

The silence on the other side of the line was indicative that she indeed had asked for way too much of him.

“YN, you know that I love you but kids hate me, and I’m not good at acting or being overwhelmingly charming like you.” Spencer explained and sighed. “Even if I help, what makes you think that it’ll be better than having no elf?”

“Because!” YN pleaded. “I need an elf or everything will be mayhem. Please, you’re only giving away candy canes to kids while wearing a costume. If you think about it, it is just like when you give out candy to trick o’ treaters on Halloween, but with more glitter and joy.”

“YN…”

“Please, please, please, pretty please with sugar on top?”

“Puppy eyes don’t work if I’m not looking at you.” Spencer chuckled as he could already picture his girlfriend giving him the cutest puppy eyes in the whole world. “Can’t you call someone else?”

“No one is available on a Thursday morning, only you and your crazy schedule. It had to be useful somehow.” YN complained irritated. She turned to see the kids who were promised to have Santa Claus visiting. Her heart fell into her stomach and it clenched. “These kids are counting on us to have a better Christmas experience. Please, Spence, I don’t want to let them down. It wouldn’t be fair for them.”

Spencer knew that YN was right. He would never fully understand why it was so important for children to meet the guy with the white beard and red suit, however he was no one to deny that experience to them. Especially the kids who had it rough and this party was probably their only opportunity to enjoy a little bit of Christmas cheer. He knew how much it meant for YN.

“I’ll be there in 20.”

“Really?” She said surprised. “Oh my God, thank you. I love you. Please hurry!”

It probably took Spencer less than twenty minutes to get to St. Francis, nonetheless YN felt like it was forever.

The women that were in charge of the St. Francis shelter had worked almost the entire year to raise money to host a Christmas party for the children to make their Christmas a little better. They deserve that and so much more. That year they received several toy donations, enough to give each boy and girl a gift of their own.

YN and her North Pole characters volunteered to help hand out the presents and add a little magic to the celebration. Everyone wanted Santa himself to give them their presents, right? Everything was going smoothly until it wasn’t, and then, YN was down one elf and all the kids began to get anxious and disappointed.

Spencer’s arrival felt godsent. YN helped him sneak inside the venue without being seen, so it wouldn’t spoil the experience for the children, into the small dressing room they all shared.

“Thank you for coming.” She greeted him with a small peck on the lips. “You need to get dressed.”

It took a moment for Spencer to adjust looking at his girlfriend dressed up as an elf. He normally saw her as an elf at the mall however, it still was somewhat fascinating to see YN with pointy ears.

“What?”

“Nothing.” Spencer shook it off and scrounged his nose slightly. “Where’s the costume?”

“Thanks for coming, man.” Jeff, one of YN’s friends who worked as an elf, said. “I really did not want to be Santa.”

“What?” Spencer questioned knitting his brows together. “But I’m here to fill in for an elf.”

“I’m not going to be Santa.” Jeff insisted. “That shit’s crazy.”

“But you told me you’d fill in for Marcus as Santa!” YN called upon Jeff.

“That was before your boyfriend came! Now he can be Santa and I can go on as an elf.”

“I will not be Santa Claus.” Spencer said firmly. “An elf I can manage, but Santa? Kids hate me. Why don’t you go out as Mrs. Claus and give out the presents?”

“I can’t!”

“Why?” The two men asked in unison.

“’Cause! Sadly, Santa is more loved than Mrs. Claus, she’s just an accessory to him even though she definitely is the one who runs the North Pole in my opinion.”

“She’s got a point. You’re up, dude.” Jeff threw at Spencer the iconic Santa hat.

“No, you’re up.” Spencer threw it back at him. “Look, you have far more experience at this, you already know how to deal with children and know Santa’s lines.”

“Spencer’s right.” YN agreed with her boyfriend and turned to Jeff. “Suit up.”

“Nah, I’m a great elf. It takes something extra to be Santa. What’s better? To have two lousy characters or an amazing elf making up for a so-so Santa?”

“Jeff’s right.” YN supported Jeff’s idea. “You’ll be ok.”

“I don’t think I can.” Spencer added. “Jeff should do it.”

“Spencer should do it.”

“Oh my God!” YN yelled, getting both of their attention. “You’re like little children. What we’re doing here is beyond what we want or don’t. I’m going to go grab the spare Santa’s beard I have in my car since the Marcus’s is all bloody, but when I come back, I expect you guys to have figured out who will be Santa.”

“How?” Jeff asked.

“I don’t know, toss a coin or something.”

“Wait, did you say that the beard Marcus was wearing as Santa is covered in blood?” Spencer jumped out while frowning. “What happened?”

“A kid was struggling with Marcus and then hit him on the nose with his head.” YN explained as if it wasn’t a big thing. “Obviously, Marcus began to bleed like crazy and stained the beard. Fortunately, the rest of the costume is fine.”

Spencer’s jaw dropped a few centimeters. YN shrugged her shoulders and left the room to get the spare beard.

“So we toss a coin?” Jeff suggested.

“A kid broke Marcus’s nose?”

“Yeah. Coin?”

Spencer nodded, still not able to process how crazy it was to actually deal with children. He was losing confidence by the second but he was already there. He was not going to be able to escape now.

Jeff prepared himself to toss the coin to find out who was going to be Santa for the day.

“Loser is Santa.” Jeff settled. “Heads or tails?”

“Heads.”

Jeff threw the coin in the air and caught it, placed it over the back of his hand, covering the winning side. He then revealed the winner.

“Tails! You’re so fucked. You’re Santa.”

“Son of a-” Spencer fought the urge to complete the curse and closed his eyes.

“Suit up” Jeff teased Spencer as he gave him the costume. Then left.

Spencer grabbed the famous red suit and began to put it on. It felt as if he was dressing up for war. He didn’t know how to deal with children, it scared him that he was potentially going to mess up and ruin the magic for them.

YN entered the room carrying the blood-free beard.

“You got to be Santa!”

“Yeah…”

YN noticed how abashed Spencer seemed with the resolution of the Santa dilemma. She felt bad about the entire situation and found herself struggling too. She didn’t like to force anyone to do anything and now Spencer seemed pretty obligated to do what she asked him. She sneaked behind him and hugged him by surrounding his waist with her arms.

“Hey, if you really, truly don’t want to do this, you can bail. I promise I won’t be mad. I understand.”

“I-I’m not going to lie, I don’t feel super comfortable doing this, but not because of what you think.”

“What am I thinking?”

“You think I don’t want to do this because I think that this isn’t important.”

“No…”

“YN, I know you.” Spencer went on, then turned around to face her. “And I also know that I have never been the most understanding of this whole ‘children meeting Santa’ thing. However, things don’t have to be understood in order to be important. And this, what you guys are doing is important.”

YN couldn’t help but to smile and nod.

“I don’t want to mess up, YN.” Spencer explained. “I’m not sure I’m fit for this but if being Santa Claus means that these kids are going to have a better Christmas, then I’ll do my best.”

YN was in love with Spencer. She had never doubted that, not even for a fraction of a second. But hearing him talk the way he was doing at that moment, made her heart extra warm and giddy. It was the realization hitting her that maybe, he was the one.

“What if they hate me?”

“They will not hate you, Spence.”

“How are you so sure?”

“Because you are dressed as freaking Santa Claus. They already love Santa Claus.” YN tried to comfort him, her hand reached for Spencer’s cheek to caress it. “All you have to do is say ‘Ho Ho Ho, Merry Christmas’ and give them a present. Plus, you are the sweetest man alive, if someone can do this, it’s you.”

YN suspired. A wave of emotion invaded her body as it came clear that Spencer was not being apathetic towards the event, he was genuinely worried about messing up.

“Jeff, your loyal elf, will be there keeping everything organized, giving out candy canes and passing the presents to you. And I’ll be there too, behind the camera capturing every single moment. If something goes sideways, Mrs. Claus will always be there for her Mr. Claus.”

Spencer cracked a laugh and nodded agreeing with her. He continued to get dressed up with YN’s help for the padding and final touches.

“You owe me big time.” Spencer teased YN.

“We’ll see about that. Come on, Santa.”

The two held hands as they made their way to the epicenter of the party where everyone expected them. Children ran, played, and had fun with the activities their caretakers had planned for them. The yelling turned into a gasp of emotion as soon as they spotted Santa Claus sitting back on his chair, ready to give out more presents.

It was the look in those children’s eyes, the bling of a true believer, of the innocence and joy, that made Spencer understand why YN did what she did every single year. He glanced at Jeff who was already trying to organize the queue for the eager kids that wanted to meet Santa, dressed up in his classic elf costume. Then he looked at YN, who was positioned behind the camera taking pictures of everything, just as promised. They locked eyes for a couple of seconds and nodded in complicity.

Spencer would’ve never thought that he would spend Christmas’s Eve morning dressed up as Santa, but not that he was there, he wouldn’t have it any other way.

“Ho! Ho! Ho! Merry Christmas!”

Song: <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbVpS_2TZCI>

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading!  
> Please let me know what you think <3
> 
> Remember that I'll be posting new shots every other day.  
> Have an amazing holiday season and please be safe!  
> Love, A.


End file.
